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Untitled Document
Fellow Citizens

Three months ago the Congress of the United States blackened the annals of
our nation by a foul crime against the people of an infant Territory. Like all
other villainies, which power could not successfully accomplish, the Administration,
beaten in its first attempt to carry the Lecompton Constitution in its original
shape, was forced to resort to a mean artifice to save them from an open and
disgraceful retreat. It is not the first time in our history that we find an
Administration driven to such desperate measures. When, in the course of our
Revolutionary struggle, the English Administration were driven to the wall,
they attempted to retrieve their fallen fortunes by purchasing a traitor to
betray the sacred cause of Liberty. This event finds a parallel in the late
attempt of Buchanan’s Administration to secure the passage of the Lecompton
Constitution. This is the only difference: Then an English Administration purchased
an American to betray his cause. Now an American Administration, purchased English
to betray the people of Kansas. The treason of Benedict Arnold was unsuccessful
in the first case, and the Second of August will witness the overthrow of the
second crime against popular Freedom.

It would be a useless consumption of time, my fellow citizens, for me to speak
to you of the long train of abuses and outrages

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which attended and culminated in the English Bill. As citizens of Kansas they
are your personal history – the narrative of your wrongs. Your earnest
and repeated petitions, against the Lecompton Constitution spurned with scorn
and contempt; your votes cast against that instrument on the Fourth of January
were disregarded; and fiendish malignancy, bitter with hatred against you because
you would not be enslaved, hurled its last shaft in a low insult to your manhood
and honor.

How little did the supporters of this English Bill know of the men they were
dealing with? How small a value did they set upon their principles? They thought
us weak; worn out by a long series of struggles; and dishearted by the many
attrocities committed against us. We were ruled by Government officials whom
we despised, and whose jurisdiction we refused to recognize. We were anxious
to surround ourselves with the evidences of prosperity and the concomitants
of civilization and education, and they anticipated an easy victory over us,
by offering us a bribe for relinquishing our opposition to the Lecompton Constitution.
Yet even in this they displayed their cowardice and treachery. They were afraid
we would reject the bribe, and prefer to take our chance of obtaining admission
at a future period, and so they added to the insult a threat. A threat that
in case we refused

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to be bribed, we should be whipped, or in other words, we should not come into
the Union until they condescended to let us in. Those ermined murders should
continue to rule us, and if we would not be a Slave State, we should remain
a Slave Territory. These are the prominent features of that infamous bill on
which we will be called upon to decide the Second of August. Not as they appear
in so many words, but as they are.

I do not appear before you my friends, because I fear that any considerations
will tempt, or any threat terrify you into a slavish compliance with the wished
of these self constituted despots. Nor do I come to ask you to vote down this
infamous measure, or instruct you how to vote upon it. I would not insult you
by such an insidious request, or disgrace you by such presumptuous directions.
I have too much faith in your firmness, your honor, your love of liberty and
truth. I know that no earthly consideration could induce you to vote for this
thing, but I come to urge you as men and as citizens of Kansas, to devote and
day for the success of the great principles you have labored for so long and
so nobly. I do not wish this crime against our liberties to be returned with
a paltry majority of one, five, or ten thousand, but I would like to see a glorious
vote, fifteen thousand strong, rolled up against it. Then we

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will stand up before the world, a living monument of the truth that no oppression
can ever conquer a people determined to be free! The greatest, grandest, proudest
moral triumph in the history of the world, hangs dependant upon your votes.
For the first time in the world’s progress, will be presented the spectacle
of a whole people who loves their principles and worship their faith with such
an ardent, enthusiastic zeal, that they sacrificed self-interest for the triumph
of right, and spurned their pecuniary interest, when its acceptance was the
price of the sacrifice of principle.

And not only should you vote it down because it is an insult, but because it
is unfair, because it is an unjust discrimination in favor of Slavery; because
it proclaims you unequal to slave-drivers and slaves; and because it is an open,
deliberate and infamous attempt to fasten Slavery upon a people who do not want
it. It is unfair for the reason that any election is a mockery which is not
free, and any election a fraud upon the rights of the people which holds out
inducements for affirmative and penalties for negative votes. It discriminates
in favor of Slavery, because it makes the admission of a Slave State easier
than that of a Free State, and it offers to pay a Slave State without a Representative
ratio, an enormous price for coming into the Union, and yet denies a Free State
admission with the same population, unless it has a Representative ratio.
It proclaims white men unequal to Negroes and slave-drivers, because it grants
a

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Territory, with 50,000 slaves and slave-holders, admission, and yet denies
a Free State admission until it has 93,000 inhabitants. And it is an infamous
attempt to fasten Slavery upon an infant State, because it provides that if
we come in with a Slave Constitution, we can come in with any population, but
if we demand another constitution, more consistent with our feelings and sentiments
we cannot be received at all.

It is unjust again because we are the losers whichever way we vote, while the
pro-slavery Democracy are the gainers in any contingency. If we vote for the
proposition, we have a Constitution repugnant to our wishes, foisted upon us,
and if we vote against the proposition, they gain again, as they prevent a Republican
delegation from taking their seats from the new State of Kansas. It is unfair
again, because if we vote for the Land Ordinance, we thereby vote for Slavery;
and if we vote against it, we vote against the dowry which, by every right and
precedent, should be ours

Four years ago Slavery made a bold advance. Then Kansas and Nebraska were to
be admitted as states, it saw they were beyond the reach of the Slave power,
because North of the Missouri Compromise Line. Nothing daunted by this, it sought
to secure at least one of these Territories as its own. It boldly repealed that
solemn compact which consecrated these Territories to Free Labor, and threw
down its gauntlet to the North, asking it to enter into competition for the
virgin soil of

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Kansas. This was done against the earnest entreaties of the majority of the
nation, and against the united voice of the North. But there was no escaping
the issue. It was forced upon them, and the great Senator from New York, on
behalf of the Free North, took up the challenge. “Come on then, gentlemen
of the Slave States, “ he responded, “since there is no escaping
your challenge, I accept it on behalf of Freedom. We will engage in competition
for the virgin soil of Kansas, and God grant the victory to the side which is
stronger in numbers as it is in right.” These were the terms, fairly stated,
fully understood. The rival forces engaged in the battle, and after a long and
fierce contest, Freedom gained the battle. The gigantic numbers of the North
proved too powerful for the weak cohorts of Slavery, and Kansas, upon the terms
of the contest, should have been free. “Sirs,” said the Free State
party, “we have engaged in this contact against our wishes and upon your
own terms. This soul was ours in justice, before, but you arrogantly demanded
that you should have equal rights in the battle, and you extorted from us a
promise to give you a chance for the mastery. We were forced to acceed to your
request, and we met you here as man to man. We have conquered. We are stronger
in numbers – stronger in right. This evil is ours! We have won it fairly,
and you must yield. It belongs to Freedom – Slavery has no right here,
and we cannot acknowledge its claims. You must no longer week to fasten it upon
us.” But Slavery was loth to relinquish its claims.

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Instead of gracefully yielding, it resorted to fraud to accomplish what it
could not do by strength of numbers. Bolstered up by the power of the Federal
Government, and with the offices under its control, rendered desperate by its
defeat, and smarting under the last of popular scorn, it announced a Convention
to form a Constitution, and by the most infamous frauds elected the members.
The Lecompton Constitution was formed, and presented to us. We voted it down
by ten thousand majority. If the principle of “Squatter Sovereignty”
had been regarded, the South should have gracefully yielded the field. But it
would not do this. The fraud had been successful in the first instance –
they depended upon it again. It was sent to Congress, and has been successful
there! Surrounded with more infamous measures than before, and our duty, our
principle, and our manhood demands that we spurn both the bribe and its authors.

We will remain a Territory. Our oppressors will go back to an indignant constituency,
pledges broken, principles trampled upon, the nation dishonored by the foul
injustice of their act. We can wait until a Republican Congress is elected;
until they and their base designs are repudiated and defeated, and Republicans,
our only friends, are elected to fill their places. The people of Kansas, whom
they have sought to crush, will rise above them, will be honored for their love
of justice; their noble sacrifice of interest for right; their heroic endurance,
and their grand and successful struggle for Freedom. Our oppressors will be
buried beneath the just indignation of their constituents. The memory of the
one will be a cherished glory which can never fade from the grateful recollection
of their countryman, or perish from the brightest and proudest records of the
human race. If pity should ever mark the resting place of the others with a
stone, it will be but to act as a warning to others to beware the paths they
trod with such fatal results to themselves.

Work, then my fellow-citizens, as Freemen alone can work. Great principles,
noble designs, a high and holy cause is dependant upon you. The Republicans,
who have sought and labored, and battled for your cause

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in Congress and the States, are looking to you for an approval of their course:
You will give it, I know, and with a hearty and generous good-will. You will
bid them God-speed, by your votes, and denounce the black designs of that infamous
party which blasphemes a name once pure and good.

It is of the utmost importance to secure every vote on this occasion. Immediately
after the election, Gov. Denver intends calling the Legislature together for
the purpose of making a new apportionment. If our county does not poll her full
vote, we will not have a fair representation, as the basis for forming this
will be the vote on the Second of August. It is for this I agreed to come before
you, and to urge you, one and all, to see that every vote in the country was
cast. I have never doubted how you will vote, but was only fearful that, conscious,
as I am myself, that this infamous proposition would be almost unanimously defeated,
now might grow too careless of the result, and neglect to work as you should.

With many thanks for your kind reception on this, my first appearance before
you in the, to me, novel position as a public speaker, and with an increased
faith in your love of right, by witnessing the enthusiasm of this meeting, I
bring my remarks to a close. This sea of human faces indicates how deep an interest
is felt in the election which is soon to be held, and clearly shows that in

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you, at least, will not be found absent from the polls, on an occasion when
your rights and liberties are in danger.

The current URL is http://www.territorialkansasonline.org/~imlskto/cgi-bin/index.php?SCREEN=show_transcript&document_id=100248.